a personal recipe app for home cooks
Estimated monthly cost at the usage scale below — billed by actual usage
0.13 req/s
Peak Concurrency
4.42 MB
Database Storage
180.24 MB
Object Storage
41.64 GB
Outbound data transfer
What is this app
This small personal recipe app serves approximately five hundred people who save and browse recipes with photos. Registered users can create recipes and save recipes for later, while visitors can browse the recipe library and open recipe details. Its core value is providing a simple shared place to store, discover, and revisit photo-supported recipes.
As an anonymous visitor, I want to browse recipes with photos so that I can discover recipes to read.
As a registered user, I want to view full recipe details so that I can follow a recipe.
As a registered user, I want to save a recipe so that I can find it again later.
As a registered user, I want to create a recipe with a photo so that it is available in the recipe library.
As a registered user, I want to view my saved recipes so that I can revisit them.
400
registered_user
People with accounts who can browse recipes, save recipes, and create recipes with photos.
0
anonymous_visitor
People who open the public recipe library without an account and only browse recipe lists and details.
Requirements to minimum viable plan to cost
Momen doesn't give a vague quote: it first sizes the project's actual demand for each capability and resource, then costs each item out.
The numbers in the "Project demand" column below — their scale assumptions and derivations — are detailed in Scale & sizing.
Minimum viable plan
BASIC
Public, ongoing recipe app requires multiple workflows, SEO, and professional presentation, making BASIC the minimum plan.
See the capability-by-capability assessment ▾
PROJECT DEMAND
ALLOWANCE PROVIDED (COMPOSITION)
Basic
Basic is the minimum viable plan
Basic
(Plan tier: BASIC)
See minimum viable plan above
39
single-tenant kit
1 req/s
not purchased
(plan/kit 5 req/s)
Covered by plan/kit (margin ~400%)
0
Database storage add-on
25.79 MB
not purchased
(plan/kit 200.00 MB)
Covered by plan/kit (margin ~676%)
0
Object storage
add-on
189.00 MB
not purchased
(plan/kit 2.00 GB)
Covered by plan/kit (margin ~958%)
0
Outbound data transfer add-on
44.71 GB/mo
500GB × 2/year, amortized monthly
(plan/kit 2.00 GB/mo + add-on +42.71 GB/mo)
Add-on fills +42.71 GB/mo gap beyond plan/kit
5.83
AI points add-on
0 points
not purchased
(plan/kit 1.0M points)
No requirement
0
plan + add-ons · usage-based · no development cost
Your options for this project
In the table below, the "monthly infrastructure" for the self-built / AI routes is derived from the AWS list prices shown below, sized against this project's actual usage.
2 × t4g.large × 730h
EC2 t4g.large → 98.11
2 × db.m6g.large (Multi-AZ) × 730h
RDS PostgreSQL db.m6g.large → 232.14
0.00 GB-month
RDS gp3 storage → 0
0.19 GB-month
S3 Standard → 0
0.00 GB (first 100GB free)
Internet egress → 0
Total ≈ $330.26 / mo
Pure cloud resources
DEVELOPMENT COST
MONTHLY CLOUD INFRA ($/MO)
MONTHLY TOTAL
(INFRA + OPS)
Traditional outsourcing / build in-house
about $45,000 - $70,000
≈ $330
Based on the AWS estimate above
≈ $2,330
Infra $330 + ops ~$2,000
4-6 months
5 / 5
Vibe Coding
about $7,000 - $12,000
≈ $330
Based on the AWS estimate above
≈ $1,830
Infra $330 + ops ~$1,500
hours
5 / 5
AI full-stack generation
about $3,000 - $6,000
≈ $330
Based on the AWS estimate above
≈ $1,830
Infra $330 + ops ~$1,500
hours
3 / 5
Off-the-shelf SaaS / vertical solution
$0
N/A
Priced per seat, not by cloud infra
≈ $16,000+
Per-seat pricing, tens of thousands of users
days
1 / 5
Momen
Recommended
$0
$45
All-in: egress / storage / auto-scaling included
$45
hours
5 / 5
Servers, databases, traffic and storage are inherent infrastructure costs for this project — you pay them whether you outsource, use Cursor or Lovable, or build it yourself (self-built runs ≈ $441/mo at AWS list prices, often more), plus the extra dev and ops staff. Momen bundles all of it into $368/mo all-in and removes the need for an ops team.
The frontend can be generated with AI tools (Cursor, Lovable, etc.); the hard part is the backend — auth, database, scaling, data security and ops. Momen delivers a production-grade backend as a BaaS: keep the vibe-coding speed on the frontend, while the backend runs on proven infrastructure — reliable, with no self-hosting or ops.
What scale this estimate assumes, and how the numbers are derived
Cost depends heavily on usage volume. First see the key assumptions and business scenarios this estimate uses, then the full calculation derived from each scenario for every resource — all adjustable to your real situation.
We assume the stable user population is about five hundred people because the project description explicitly identifies a small personal recipe app with about five hundred users. This reference population includes registered users and a smaller pool of anonymous visitors who may browse public recipes. If the app becomes private or gains broader public distribution, this parameter can be adjusted accordingly.
We assume a standard linear-growth pattern because this is a small personal recipe application that accumulates users, recipes, saves, and photos gradually rather than launching with a full pre-existing dataset or experiencing a short recent burst. If the app is imported with a complete recipe library at launch, this parameter can be adjusted toward a full-year equivalent.
Daily Recipe Browsing
Daily Recipe Browsing
Daily Recipe Browsing
Daily Recipe Browsing
30
times/month
0.13 req/s
Peak load
We assume daily recipe discovery is a broad, weakly assembled usage period rather than a synchronized event. Anonymous visitors and registered users browse at different rates and have different purposes, so public discovery and registered browsing are kept separate. The period spans ordinary daytime and evening use, represented as a two-hour window that occurs daily. No external signal concentrates all users into a narrow burst.
Main impact: Peak Concurrency
The scenarios above set the assumptions for each resource; below is the full calculation based on those assumptions. Click to expand each item.
How this app works
What exactly does this budget support? Broken down by business scenario, showing the pages, data tables, automation flows and AI
assistant behind each one.
Public browsing flow for discovering and reading recipes.
Recipe Home Page
users
Registered-user flow for browsing a recipe and saving it for later.
Recipe Home Page
users
Registered-user flow for creating a recipe and viewing the published result.
Recipe Home Page
users
Registered-user flow for revisiting saved recipes.
Recipe Home Page
users
page
data_table
Recipe Home Page
Public recipe discovery page showing a list of saved recipes with photos.
Recipe Detail Page
Detailed recipe reading page with the option for a registered user to save the recipe.
Create Recipe Page
Form for a registered user to add a recipe and its photo to the shared library.
Saved Recipes Page
Personal list of recipes saved by the registered user.
What you might want to know about this project
The Q&A below is generated by AI based on this project's type, features and scale.
What user scale is assumed for this recipe app?
Which features are included in the estimate?
What mainly affects image storage and bandwidth usage?
Do users need accounts to browse recipes?
How are saved recipes represented in the data model?
Copy to discuss with AI
Challenge & re-estimate